190 The Winning of the West 



dusky, the bitterest foes of the Americans, and 

 those most completely under British influence. They 

 were on the trail that the war-parties followed 

 whether they struck at Kentucky or at the valleys 

 of the Alleghany and Monongahela. Consequently 

 the Sandusky Indians used the Moravian villages 

 as half-way houses, at which to halt and refresh 

 themselves whether starting on a foray or return- 

 ing with scalps and plunder. 



By the time the war had lasted four or five years 

 both the wild or heathen Indians and the backwoods- 

 men had become fearfully exasperated with the un- 

 lucky Moravians. The Sandusky Indians were 

 largely Wyandots, Shawnees, and Delawares, the 

 latter being fellow-tribesmen of the Christian In- 

 dians; and so they regarded the Moravians as trai- 

 tors to the cause of their kinsfolk, because they would 

 not take up the hatchet against the whites. As they 

 could not goad them into declaring war, they took 

 malicious pleasure in trying to embroil them against 

 their will, and on returning from raids against the 

 settlements often passed through their towns solely 

 to cast suspicion on them and to draw down the 

 wrath of the backwoodsmen on their heads. The 

 British at Detroit feared lest the Americans might 

 use the Moravian villages as a basis from which to 

 attack the lake posts ; they also coveted their men as 

 allies; and so the baser among their officers urged 

 the Sandusky tribes to break up the villages and 

 drive off the missionaries. The other Indian tribes 

 likewise regarded them with angry contempt and 



